BRRRR- My first home investment

[Jewell Arceneaux]

Purchased home with potential upside in hoping to force appreciation in the house in order to create equity and eventually utilize the equity (HELOC) to begin investing in other properties. What do you feel are the most important things to upgrade in a home that you've seen increase home value?

[Evan Polaski]

@Jewell Arceneaux, you are selling an experience to both your lender, appraiser and tenant.  There is no given answer here, because the whole property needs to be relatively consistent.

Kitchens and baths are the common answer, but if they are passable and you choose to invest in them anyways at the expense of peeling paint (or off putting exterior color) and overgrown landscaping, the appraiser and tenant will be walking up with a bad taste in their mouth, thereby not valuing the interior work you have done.

But think about the general flow of someone looking to rent: more bedrooms will typically dictate more rent.  Can you easily add a bedroom without making the flow feel weird (i.e. accessing one bedroom by going through another) or taking away from common area making them feel small?  If you can reasonably throw up a new wall and closet, turning a 3 bed into a 4 bed, that is a great place to start, but only if it works for the property and you have at least 2 full bathrooms.  A 4 bed, 1 bath is typically a non-starter.

Improving kitchens and baths.  again, this tends to be the go to renovation for many.  Taste and style changes more frequently in these areas, so they feel dated faster.  

I, personally, tend to go nicer on both design and finish.  I.e. quartz countertops look nicer than granite and are much more durable than laminate.  Tiling your tub surrounds to the ceiling not only looks nicer, but also helps waterproof the area better, and will likely never need replaced (versus vinyl surround which last about 3 yrs before tenants start cracking them, in my experiences).